Al-Tounsi

by Anton Piatigorsky

  3

  ORIGINAL SIN

  THE SUPREME COURT did the right thing Monday morning by ruling that an archaic anti-sodomy law from Arkansas was unconstitutional. Although Justice Quinn read a fiery dissent from the bench, he did not have the votes to prevent the 20-year precedent, which he had written himself, from being overruled in the landmark 6–3 decision. We think it only fair that Killian Quinn, the Court’s most conservative Catholic, will no longer be the arbiter of what gay and lesbian people are allowed to do in the privacy of their own homes. The Supreme Court has finally extended a measure of justice and civil rights to millions of gay Americans.

  Thus sayeth The New York Times—or rather the cabal of silver-spoon-fed editors at the helm of that smug rag, those French-cuffed, high-heeled, tortoise-rimmed elites who obviously had no real knowledge of why the Constitution was enacted, or what its proper function should be in the United States of America. Killian tossed the insulting newspaper onto his desk and squeezed his Federalist Society Conference mug with both beefy hands. How could any big-city, East Coast newspaper feel so comfortable telling the rest of the country definitively what justice is and how it should be served? On what authority did the editors speak? They certainly didn’t have the law credentials. It was astounding—no, breathtaking—to witness the bloated sense of entitlement of that navel-gazing paper. Their offensive pronouncements had set Killian’s heart racing, and if only somebody were sitting with him in chambers right now, he would regale them with an extended rant.

  Steady, old boy. Tantrums were bad for his health. Killian pinched his nose at its thin bridge, and then drew his thumb and fingertip down to its enlarged tip, a rounded soccer ball of flesh with nostrils. Fat gaosán of a ruddy Irish boy. The flesh beneath Killian’s eyes pulsed with his rage. Impossible to cork his inner volcano once it got rumbling. He ran his fingers through the tufts of straw-colored hair sprouting behind his temples, all that remained of his once thick and curly mop.

  Coyote, a foul-mouthed devil in a red satin cape that Killian drew out of the air in these moments of high stress, hovered over his left shoulder. “Folger,” he muttered, through his tobacco-stained teeth, referring to the famous Shakespeare Library on East Capital Street, around the corner from the Supreme Court Building. “You can sit your fat self down in Katherine’s armchair and beg her to climb on top.” Killian conjured an image of Katherine Kirsch, the Folger library’s impish curator of manuscripts—her boyish build, pixie-cut blond hair and icy-blue irises.

  “Gloria, Gloria, Gloria,” countered the winged angel McGovern, frowning severely over Killian’s opposite shoulder, wearing a peace medallion, comb-over and long sideburns. Killian had named this demonic and celestial duo back in the 1970s, when he realized that a conflicted soul would be his life-long predicament, and he decided to embrace and personalize the dual forces of his conscience. Coyote was named in honor of that indestructible and wily antagonist of the Roadrunner cartoons that his kids liked to watch on Saturday mornings. McGovern was and remained the perfect moniker for his angel, because the poor bleeding heart always lost the final vote.

  Gloria wasn’t a reference to Gloria in Excelsis Deo, the primary doxology of the Roman Catholic Mass, although that too would have been an effective appeal to Killian’s conscience. No, McGovern was intoning the name of his beloved wife, Gloria Quinn (née Scarlatti), former high school sweetheart, mother of their six children, and a woman the Justice loved passionately, despite his five-plus decades of adultery and mortal sin.

  “She is your soulmate, and you should picture her as she was the evening you met, chaste and pure, standing awkwardly beneath the streamers and balloons at your interschool dance in Mount Saint Joseph Academy’s gymnasium. Place her now in your mind’s eye. I know you can do that. Do you want to deceive that innocent woman, Killian? Do you want to abuse her trust?”

  “Oh, the wife’ll be around when you get home,” countered Coyote, long-snouted, irascible, and pinching a smoldering cigarette between his lips. “In the meantime, you’ve got to battle through your exasperating day.” He gave the Justice’s thick neck a prick with his cartoon pitchfork.

  “Gloria.” McGovern flapped his white wings and clung pathetically to his harp.

  “We’re talking here about an unparalleled piece of ass!”

  Killian laughed at the banter of his dueling angel and devil, who had once again pulled him from fulmination into joy. He had originally discovered his stock characters while reading Christopher Marlowe’s Doctor Faustus in an undergraduate Elizabethan drama class at Boston College, back in the spring of 1962, but refined them in his modern, low-brow terms decades later, when lounging in the modest living room of a young woman he had just met and seduced, trying to ignore his guilty conscience by flipping through channels on her cable TV, and alighting on the famed toga party scene in Animal House. Larry, a freshman recruit played by Tom Hulce, invited an intoxicated underage girl up to his room, who promptly passed out on his bed without her shirt on, leaving him holding two handfuls of the tissue she had used to stuff her bra. When he regarded the drunken girl and the tissues and considered his options, the angel and devil of his conscience appeared on either side of the screen, whispering their contrary pieces of advice. “Fuck her,” rasped the devil, dressed in a cheesy satin cape and holding a pitchfork. “Fuck her brains out. Suck her tits, squeeze her buns. You know she wants it.” Killian had laughed out loud, his big belly shaking. All that was good and noble in him disagreed with that devil’s advice—a nasty and crude suggestion, to fuck the drunken girl’s brains out, a direct challenge to the sacred teachings of his Catholic boyhood, to the morals and values he so treasured—but he also recognized in it his own impulses dramatized. “Bingo,” Killian told the television, pointing at it with the remote control. “That’s me to a T.”

  McGovern and Coyote dissipated. Killian put his feet up, crossed his ankles on his desk and tilted his head back to gaze at the stag elk mounted on the wall behind him. A splendid creature, shot on vacation in northwestern Alberta with Clayton Garfield, the present Secretary of Defense, in the dark days of the previous Democratic administration, when Garfield worked as a consultant for an oil company and made a seven-figure salary. Lucky bastard. The elk’s huge antlers sheltered his chair as if they were the branches of a rainforest canopy or the wings of a guardian angel. If only life could offer such protection.

  He sighed and caught his breath, and then his anger surged again, the adrenaline dilating his veins and whipping his heart into action. How could he have been pushed into the meaningless minority on a crucial case yet again? But there was more to his exasperation than the personal insult of some stupid editorial on Geitz v. Arkansas in The New York Times. It was also that doggone petitioners’ reply brief filed for Al-Tounsi v. Shaw, or rather the shocking, sworn declaration attached to that brief by a certain Colonel Michael Inge of the U.S. Navy. Killian had just reread it in the backseat of a Lincoln Town Car on his way into work that morning, half-tempted to roll down his window on the 14th Street Bridge and toss the thing into the Potomac. He didn’t doubt Colonel Inge’s credentials or even his frank assessment of the CSRT procedures’ flaws, but he was astonished that a so-called “patriot” would dream of ratting out his superior officer in public on a matter of such importance to national security. Where was this man’s military integrity? Where was the respect? Furthermore, Justice Quinn simply could not understand how the Shaw administration had supplied Colonel Inge with such potent fuel. How could they have acted so irresponsibly in their regulation of those crucial CSRT procedures? Why did the Department of Defense not do a better job monitoring fairness? Didn’t they realize the whole world was watching?

  And what about the gall of those elite law firms and constitutional rights centers behind the reply brief? Did they really think they would be able to reverse a denial of cert at the Supreme Court for the first time in 60 years? And what about the arrogance of Colonel Inge’s superior, some jerk of a rear
admiral named Ryan Bonairre? Good Lord, were there any people left on this planet willing to embrace their responsibilities and limitations, and ready to take the blame for their mistakes? It was impossible, outright impossible, to keep the United States on the right track in these difficult times when idiots and fools mishandled the reins of power, no matter how noble their ideologies or principles might be.

  The justices were going to reconsider Al-Tounsi’s certiorari in conference that afternoon. In the worst-case scenario, Gideon would grin in victory, self-satisfied. Justice Rosen, God love him, was a good man and decent jurist (in his own misguided way), but never a modest winner. He would laugh and boast; he would positively gloat; and most important, he would use the Inge declaration to flip Davidson and Katsakis. Oh, yes, Katsakis would flip—and he was the key vote in this whole thing. They would grant that case cert, and although Killian might hoot and holler and make himself sick, there wasn’t much that he could do to defend denial in the face of such explosive new evidence.

  His neck veins pulsed. It was bad for his blood pressure to think about it. There was a clear and correct road for the country to follow—the guiding lines so freshly painted they glowed in the dark—and yet the various drunks at the wheels of the judicial, executive and legislative branches swerved across that right path like Gramma Quinn’s Fiat in her final years, veering toward poles and trees and perilous cliffs, reducing the helpless U.S. citizens packed in the back into a heap of sweaty fools. And Killian, who understood his limited role as a federal judge, was not authorized to take the wheel from them. He was stuck in the passenger seat, offering futile directions.

  There was a party being thrown for departing clerks in the West Conference Room. Most years a comparable event was scheduled for Wednesday happy hour, a long-standing tradition, but for some unknown reason, this year the final party had been switched. Bagels would be served. Tuna salad, coffee, cream cheese. A gathering of young and brilliant lawyers, full of vim and vigor, roughly half of whom would be female. And there would be no discussion whatsoever about homosexual sodomy legislation or reply brief declarations from treasonous colonels in the United States Navy. Killian pulled himself out of his seat and slipped on his jacket. He left chambers and hobbled his large self into the hall, huffing from the effort.

  Killian’s chambers were located on the southwest corner of the Supreme Court Building’s first floor, meaning the Justice had to waddle past the lawyer’s lounge and across the marbled Great Hall, decorated with busts of past Chief Justices, to reach the clerks’ party. His sciatica fired hot flares down the nerves in his legs, so he walked the shortest possible route. The problem with that plan was that passing through the Great Hall was risky, as it was open to the public. An eager follower of the Court might recognize and detain him with blunt questions about originalism, or with numbskull thoughts on foreign policy, or with pictures of some cocker spaniel named Killian.

  The Great Hall was full. Early summer tourists carried point-and-shoot cameras and thick guidebooks. They wore shorts and T-shirts, tank tops, spaghetti-strap sundresses. As feared, a middle-aged man in a polo shirt recognized Justice Quinn when he entered, even though Killian barreled through the hall with his head lowered. The man called Quinn’s name. A couple of intrepid tourists angled themselves against the wall to photograph the passing Justice, while others stepped back to gawk openly. Killian absorbed their collective awe with his peripheral vision, sensing the electricity that he had inadvertently injected into the room. It was insane how he was treated more like a famous actor or pop star than a boring federal judge. Although it was sometimes fun to be this revered and reviled, to be considered worthy, it also got old. What was notoriety worth if he couldn’t achieve decent legal results for the country? If he was rendered futile by eight other justices? When Killian reentered the restricted zone on the north side of the building, he heard a tourist whispering behind him, “Which one was that?” and another breathlessly responding “Justice Quinn! Justice Quinn!” as if his name were Mick Jagger. At least his fellow Americans now considered his brand of respectful textual analysis important. And maybe there was more to their fandom, Killian thought, as he approached the West Conference Room. He was a colorful and frank personality, and he wrote in pithy phrases.

  The oak-paneled West Conference Room was full of clerks and justices. Killian closed the door behind him and made his way over to the buffet table, covered with a white tablecloth. He chose a poppy-seed bagel to spread thickly with cream cheese. Above him loomed the famed, mustachioed former U.S. President and Chief Justice William Taft in a large standing portrait, his right hand tucked into his robe, as if he were hungry and his belly was rumbling. Now, there was a fat man. Good gracious, if Killian wasn’t more careful with his food, he would soon reach the splendid rotundity of old Bill Taft, and end up in an early grave. He layered the cream cheese with tomatoes, onions and capers, took a large bite, and nudged the tomato back on his bagel with his pinky. He turned to survey the group. He knew the names and faces of the 36 departing clerks, but a lot of good that would do him, as they would all begin leaving their posts at the end of this week. A new batch of clerks would begin filtering into the Court for their year-long terms on Monday, and right away start reviewing cert petitions and writing memos over the justices’ summer holiday. When he returned to the Court in September, Killian would have to learn new names, like he did every year.

  Three of Killian’s four departing clerks surrounded him, including Isaac Marx, a Canadian from Montreal with a kind, round face, number one in his Harvard Law class, and perhaps Killian’s best employee in his 20 years on the Court. Isaac was an Orthodox Jew, never seen without his kippah, even while sprinting down the basketball court on the top floor of the Court building. Isaac had breezed through his work all year, unchallenged by the most complicated questions, as if he had been clerking for decades. A genius, that one. To Isaac’s right stood the pale and gaunt Alexa Ruff, number two in her class at Cornell, a dark-eyed and red-haired rail of a woman, fierce and acerbic, the wittiest of Quinn’s clerks that term. Next to Alexa stood Martin Croll, second in his class at Yale, bespectacled and meticulously groomed, archly conservative, and frankly a bit of a dud. Martin had a photographic memory, which must have served him well in law school, and also for certain tasks at the Court, but offered little in the way of creativity. Martin would easily slip into the ranks of some corporate law firm, Killian had long ago decided, destined for big bucks but not much legal innovation. The other two, though, could go somewhere big. This trio of young lawyers gathered around him at the buffet.

  “Honestly, Justice Quinn, it’s going to be difficult stomaching a normal job after this,” said Alexa Ruff. “I’m going to fall asleep at my desk in the Justice Department, the work’ll be so boring.”

  “This has been an opportunity of a lifetime,” added Isaac Marx. “I’m so thankful.”

  “Me too.” Martin Croll was wearing a golden silk tie with such a big knot that it might as well have been an ascot.

  Killian smiled and thanked his clerks. It was wonderful to have such devoted employees, but their praise was really nothing more than an embarrassment and a distraction, an unnecessary ego-stroking that at worst would make him lessen his vigilance, and even at best would do nothing to help establish his jurisprudence. Quinn shook their hands and separated. He ambled over to Justice Sykes, who was standing stiff and still, with a bemused smile on his face, by the end of the buffet table. Rodney greeted Killian with a slight nod, but didn’t say anything. His hands were pulled behind his back, as if he were a waiter charged with the responsibility of guarding the food rather than an esteemed Supreme Court justice celebrating the departure of his clerks.

  “Howdy, Rodney, I see you’ve come out to party.”

  “Indeed. I have put on my party hat.”

  “Figuratively speaking.”

  “It should go without saying, Killian, I am not a big wearer of hats.”

  “Or a big ea
ter. No bagels for ya this morning?”

  “I ate before I arrived.”

  Something about Rodney wasn’t right. The man seemed off, comically tired, big bags under his eyes, worry lines etched in his forehead and across his cheeks. Although Rodney Sykes had always impressed Killian with his pseudo-European mannerisms—his half-nod greetings with a tilted head, his gentle fingers on your back when he let you pass through the door, and those interlocked hands pulled behind him—gestures that could have been dismissible as insecure pretentions but somehow read as genuine, today Killian detected the Herculean effort behind Rodney’s rigid posture. The brittle fragility beneath his composure was broadcast in his face.

  “What’s up, Rodney? Gotta say, you don’t look yourself.”

  Justice Sykes fired an angry glare at him, the first time that Killian could remember striking a nerve in the stoic man.

  “I assure you, Killian, I am myself through and through, despite any appearances to the contrary.”

  “Oh, I don’t doubt it.” Killian took another bite of his bagel. A blob of cream cheese fell off, skimming the Justice’s lapel and landing on the hardwood floor with a splat. Killian ignored it. “Frankly, Rodney,” he added, his mouth packed full of semi-masticated food, “looks to me like you made the mistake of sticking your head in the washing machine for a cycle or two, and that you haven’t been sleeping either.”

  That joke, at least, made Rodney smile. “No need to restrain your honest opinion, Justice Quinn.”